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It had nominated The Min as an Asset of Community Value which, if it had been accepted by Bath and North East Somerset Council, would have allowed community groups six months to put together a bid to purchase the hospital.

The Grade-II* Listed hospital has been sold to Winchester-based Versant Developers & Homes.

A spokesman for the Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust said: “We are delighted to confirm that we have exchanged contracts with Versant (Mineral Hospital) Ltd for the sale of the Mineral Water Hospital. We are confident the sale will be for the benefit of our patients and the Trust. We look forward to working with Versant until the sale is formally completed."

Gordon Isgrove, regional senior director at GVA, the trust’s commercial property adviser during the sale, said: “The marketing of the property attracted a huge amount of interest from national and international organisations from the development sector. We are pleased to have agreed a sale with Versant following a competitive sale process."

BPT CEO Caroline Kay said the group "looks forward to any formal announcement from either vendor or purchaser. We intend to continue to take an active interest the Min and how its future will be determined."

Caroline Kay

Her statement continued: "We hope that any developer has the imagination and commitment to Bath to deliver something which will continue to benefit the whole community.

"We would like to remind the developer that the entirety of the building is covered by its listed status and all changes will be subject to listed building application considerations. We are concerned that the developer has apparently only stated that ‘we will not be changing the external façade'."

She added: "While BPT cannot formally ask for a review of the decision not to list the Min as an asset of community value, it is possible to make a further application which attempts to meet the perceived weaknesses of the earlier application. This would then apply to any future on-sale of the Min by Versant Properties. We are currently considering the likelihood of success for such an approach."

The Min was listed for sale by the Royal United Hospital earlier this year, through property adviser GVA.